THE Constitution is the supreme law of the land. It is the mechanism devised to put checks and balances on governments in the exercise of executive power.

Guyana’s constitution has seen several changes since the days of the Waddington Constitution of the early 1950’s which saw the introduction of Universal Adult Suffrage and the introduction of the ministerial system of governance.

Prior to 1953, the franchise was limited to only those who own property or who enjoy a certain level of income. This effectively prevented a significant number of Guyanese from exercising the right to vote.

There can be no doubt that the country has made significant advances in terms of constitutional developments even though there were attempts by the previous PNC administration to subvert the constitution to serve the interests of the ruling elite.

QUOTE: Guyana’s constitution has seen several changes since the days of the Waddington Constitution of the early 1950’s which saw the introduction of Universal Adult Suffrage and the introduction of the ministerial system of governance.

It must be noted for the records that the first attempt at constitutional manipulation took place during the elections of 1957 when the British Government amended the constitution to allow for changes to the electoral boundaries in order to prevent the PPP from attaining political victory.

Those of course were the days when the country was still a colony of Great Britain and therefore was not in control of its domestic affairs.

The aim then was to reconfigure electoral boundaries in order to give the opposition a political advantage. This was done by allocating more seats in PNC strongholds such as Georgetown and simultaneously reducing the number of seats in perceived PPP strongholds.

Again, in the elections of 1964, the constitution was further amended to allow for a new system of voting, Proportional Representation which again was designed to defeat the PPP at the polls.

The thinking then was that the PPP’s Parliamentary strength on the basis of the first- past- the-post or constituency model was larger than its popular or electoral strength.

An obvious solution of defeating the PPP was to change the electoral system which in fact saw the removal of the PPP from the seat of government even though the PPP won the plurality in terms of attaining the largest bloc of votes.

Changes in the constitution were again designed to institutionalize PNC dictatorial rule in 1980.  It was the PPP that again was at the receiving end.

One salient point about the 1980 Constitution was that it did away with the need to hold a referendum to extend the life of  Government when elections were constitutionally due.

This was facilitated by way of two-thirds of the votes in Parliament. By way of a rigged referendum, the PNC extended the life of government by an additional two years until elections were held in December 1980.

The 1970 Constitution required that for certain amendments to be made there had to be a plebiscite or a referendum which can then be passed by a two-thirds majority of the House.

The notorious referendum of 1978 was poorly received although the PNC proudly proclaimed that 71% of eligible voters participated and that 97% approved the referendum!

Unbiased observers estimated the turnout at between 10-14%. The poor turnout was due in large part to an opposition boycott, in particular that of the PPP.

One week after the Referendum, the government, using its ‘power’ at the referendum, amended the constitution by its stolen 2/3 majority in parliament to prolong the life of parliament and thus avoided the need for a general election.

Four days after, the Parliament re-constituted itself into a ‘Constituent Assembly’ to draft a new ‘Socialist’ Constitution for the country. The Constituent Assembly received submissions for constitutional amendments from a number of organizations but in the end it accepted only the draft submitted by the PNC much to the dismay of the Trade Union Congress which had presented comprehensive proposals.

A re-convened Parliament in 1980 then approved by two-thirds majority the PNC Draft Constitution which eventually became the new Constitution of Guyana.  The Constitution created the post of an Executive President with almost unlimited powers.

It also established the system of ten Regional Democratic Councils. One interesting feature of the 1980 Constitution was the attempted marginalization of the main political opposition by styling Dr. Jagan as “Leader of the Minority Party”  as opposed to the term Opposition Leader.

This nomenclature was changed in the constitutional amendments in 1997 which also saw significant reductions in the powers of the president including the setting of term limits for the President.

One significant feature of the 1997 Constitution was that it was fully participatory with full participation of all important stakeholders including that of the PNCR.

The Constitution also makes provision for meaningful consultation with the Opposition on all major appointments as opposed to token consultations as was the case under the PNC. This makes our Constitution fairly advanced when compared to those in other countries of the Caribbean.

This is not to suggest that we have a perfect Constitution. The Constitutional Reform Commission set up by the new Constitution is tasked with coming up with new ideas for continuing reforms aimed at deepening the democratic processes.